


To Taste

by Celia_and



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: All Ben wants to eat is Rey, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Restaurant, Cooking, Cunnilingus, F/M, Kitchen Sex, One Shot, Oral Sex, Pining, Smut, i don't make the rules
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-30
Updated: 2020-03-30
Packaged: 2021-02-28 20:02:11
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,101
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23382739
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Celia_and/pseuds/Celia_and
Summary: “I don’t understand the question.”“I thought it was pretty clear. Why do you want to eat me out?”“Because...because I haven’t been able to taste anything since I met you.”----------There’s a new cook in Ben’s kitchen, and all he wants to eat is her.
Relationships: Kylo Ren/Rey, Rey/Ben Solo, Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren
Comments: 71
Kudos: 720





	To Taste

**Author's Note:**

  * For [PunkForTheMoment](https://archiveofourown.org/users/PunkForTheMoment/gifts).



> This is based on a [one-tweet microfic](https://twitter.com/CeliaAnd2/status/1243545016636768256) that I expanded following PunkForTheMoment’s encouragement! 💛

She started three weeks ago, freshly graduated from culinary school, and three weeks ago Ben’s cooking started suffering.

It would’ve been fine if she’d been assigned to a different station. Why couldn’t she have been tasked with sauces, or poultry? Why couldn’t she have studied pastry instead? Or he would’ve been equally happy if instead she’d decided to become an astronaut or a dermatologist or a National Geographic photographer or anything, _anything,_ other than the line cook assigned to the station next to his.

There’s no margin for error in a kitchen, Ben knows from experience. And that used to be fine. He was a perfectionist and he was perfect. He was meticulous and laser-focused, and if any cog went awry in the machine that is this kitchen, it was never because of him.

But then came _her._ She didn’t smile when she was introduced to him. He knows the type. A young cook trying to make it clear that they aren’t here to make friends, that they take their craft seriously. He’d seen her type two dozen times before, but never with those hazel eyes. He thought it was just her eyes, but then he sees her cook for the first time and she’s so intent on getting the technique textbook-perfect that her lips part slightly in concentration. And then her tongue darts out to wet them. And he’s a goner.

That day, he makes a mistake: he forgets to add the shallots. By the time he realizes, it’s too late. He needs to scrap the dish and start again, and when the runner comes to collect that table’s order, everything is ready except Ben’s dish. Ben is mortified. It won’t happen again, he resolves. It can’t. But then a week later, he sees the hair at her temples escapes her severe bun and the wisps caress her skin. That night he adds mint instead of marjoram.

Once was a fluke. Twice is a pattern.

The following week, he happens to notice how red-faced she gets bending over a pot of boiling water and his mind unhelpfully supplies the idea that that might be how she looks flushed with pleasure. He burns his wrist and has to stop at the peak of dinner service to bandage it.

Once was a fluke. Twice was a pattern. Three times is a serious problem.

It’s not just the actual errors he’s making—it’s the fact that food doesn’t taste as good anymore. He makes a dish he’s made a hundred times before in the exact same way, and when he tastes it, it’s...bland. He doesn’t understand it. Everything is bland, now.

He devotes his day off to collect himself and take stock. He can’t go on like this, obviously: anything less than perfection isn’t permissible. He goes for a long run, and thirteen miles in, he arrives at a decision. One of three things needs to happen—either:

1) she needs to leave, or

2) he does, or

3) he needs to eat her out.

Option 1 is preferable to 2, of course. Why should this frustratingly bewitching upstart get to stay? He was there first. (Of course, judging by their performance since she started, she probably deserves the job more, but that’s neither here nor there.)

The wildcard alternative is option 3. The only reason he included it on the list is because, following in the tradition of great chefs, he lives and dies by superstition. He suspects that she sapped his sense of taste, and he may be able to get it back by eating it out of her. And then he’d be able to focus, too, if he just gets her out of his system. Or rather, gets her _into_ his system first, so he can get her out. This is entirely logical.

He walks into the kitchen the next day like he’s going to his doom. This day will decide his fate.

She’s no less alluring than ever, which is frustrating but not surprising. He keeps stealing glances at her during dinner service despite himself. _God,_ does he want option 3. He makes it through the night without any unforgivable errors, for which he’s grateful, but the worst trial is yet to come.

They wash the counter side by side, scrubbing it to a lather, rinsing, and squeegeeing until dry. They’ve settled into a rhythm, the two of them. They don’t speak. They don’t need to. He knows when to step back to let her pass. She knows to pull as he pushes. Words aren’t necessary—except that they are, tonight.

So when she’s taken her apron off and is putting her coat on, he clears his throat and says, “Rey, can I talk to you a minute?” She looks surprised but doesn’t refuse, just finishes zipping her coat up and crosses her arms, waiting. Giving him nothing.

Ben waits, too, for the rest of the staff to file out. The last person out hits the light without thinking, so they’re left in the semidarkness.

 _This is good,_ Ben thinks. _Maybe it’ll be easier if I can’t see her._

Rey stalks over to the light switch and flips it back on, then crosses her arms again. This probably isn’t good, actually.

“Well?” she asks impatiently. It’s late. Of course she wants to get home.

He wants her.

“I’ve been...distracted, lately,” he starts tentatively.

“Yeah, I noticed,” she retorts.

“You did?”

“The mint thing? Rookie mistake. And I don’t think I’ve burned myself cooking since I was, like, nine.”

So she noticed. Okay. This is still salvageable. “That’s not how I am, normally.”

“Really? Because the whole time I’ve been here you’ve screwed up at least weekly. Seems like a pattern.”

If it were anyone else, Ben would be furious. But he’d be happy to let her berate him all day if it meant she would talk to him. “That’s the thing. It’s only since you’ve been here.”

“What, up until three weeks ago you were perfect?”

“Well, yeah.”

“Seems like you’re slipping, Solo.”

“It’s not my fault.”

“Oh? It’s someone else’s fault that you’re messing up left and right?”

“Yes,” he insists. “It’s yours.”

She scoffs. “Oh, really. How do you figure that, exactly?”

“You’re...distracting.”

“I don’t even know what that’s supposed to mean.”

“Your mouth, and your skin when it gets red, and your hair comes out of your bun...it’s distracting.”

“I’ll have you know this is a perfectly food-safe hairstyle, I have no idea what your objection to my mouth is, and I don’t know what to tell you, bud, but I have skin, so deal with it.”

She’s so _frustrating_. “That’s not what I mean. None of that is what I mean.”

“Then spit it out, Solo, because it’s late, and I honestly don’t know what the point...”

He cuts her off. “I want to eat you out.”

She gapes at him. It takes her a few seconds to recover, then she says, “I think I might’ve misheard you, it sounded like you said...”

“I want to eat you out.”

“That’s...unexpected.” Her expression doesn’t give anything away. “Why?”

“I don’t understand the question.”

“I thought it was pretty clear. Why do you want to eat me out?”

“Because...because I haven’t been able to taste anything since I met you.”

“It seems like you might have a medical condition,” she retorts. “Has your doctor prescribed oral sex?”

“No, but if you know one who would, I’d love a referral.”

She catches herself before she lets a full smile slip out, but he sees the faintest ghost of one.

He presses on. “Food is everything to me, but ever since I saw you, it’s all bland. It’s like my whole sense of taste has been redirected to sight, and I can’t stop watching your hair, and your skin when it gets red, and your lips when they’re wet. And all I want to eat is you.”

She considers for several agonizing moments. At last she says, “Fine. On one condition.”

“Anything.”

“Admit that I’m a better cook than you.”

“Well I don’t know about _that_.”

“Have a good night, Solo.” She turns to leave.

“You’re a better cook than me.”

“That’s what I thought you said.” She unzips her coat, shrugs it off, and hangs it up. She walks over to their metal counter and leans back against it, right between his workspace and hers. Breaching what until now has been a no man’s land.

Ben advances until he’s close enough that she has to tilt her head up to look into his eyes. She’s never looked up to him before. He likes it.

“You’d better get me off,” she warns. “That ridiculous mouth has to be good for something.”

“What ridiculous about my...”

She cuts him off with a finger to his lips. “Don’t talk. Just eat.”

 _That_ he can do.

She hooks her thumbs beneath the waistband of her pants and panties, and pushes both down to mid-thigh without ceremony. She hops up onto the metal surface with her bare ass, sullying what they’d just cleaned.

Ben never thought he liked mess before. Now he’s pretty sure he loves it.

He goes to pull her pants all the way down, but she stops him impatiently: “Shoes, first.”

He bends down and pulls them off, grateful that they’re clogs. He doesn’t think he has the fine motor dexterity required for shoelaces right now. He tugs her pants and panties down, down, until they slip off her feet. He lays them on the counter next to her and looks at her.

Their eyes are almost exactly level now. She looks at him with something that he could almost mistake for vulnerability, but it’s masked by the steely gaze of a challenge.

He steps forward until his pelvis hits her knees. He grasps them in both hands and starts to gently pry them apart, but her muscles tense and for the barest moment he thinks she’s changed her mind. But then she lets him guide them open until they’re spread wide enough for his hips. He steps forward. A perfect fit.

He hesitates, wondering if he’s allowed to kiss her. That wasn’t part of the bargain. Maybe if he says again that she’s the better cook, she’d let him. He’d tell her every minute of every day if she would just let him kiss those lips that have made his life a paradise of misery.

“Rey, I...”

“I said don’t talk.”

She reaches out and traces his jaw with one finger. He shivers. She runs her fingertips over his cheek to his mouth, tracking the curve of his lips. Too soon they’re gone, and he’s lost without her touch, but her hand is at his temple, right at the spot where her hair drives him insane. Her nails card through his hair until she reaches the crown of his head, then she grabs a handful. He stifles a yelp. She smiles the first true smile he’s seen from her, but it’s more like a grin, and it promises heat and sin and the things he might find between her legs.

She pushes down on the tuft in her grasp, and he remembers what he’s here for. What he’s _meant_ for. He bends at the waist until he’s bowed down to her.

He kisses his way up her thighs—she permits him this, at least, sitting back dispassionately braced against one hand while the other stays in his hair.

When he drags his tongue over the down of her legs, his taste buds come alive. Her skin tastes faintly of salt. _This_ is what salt tastes like! Now he remembers. He laps at it greedily, making his way slowly upwards, not even thinking about his final destination in his hedonistic enjoyment of the journey. But then his nose nudges a juncture and he remembers. Oh, does he remember.

He takes his time, carefully tracing her outer lips with the fingers of both hands. He spreads her thighs wider, and she lets him. He presses a deliberate kiss to one lip, careful not to touch her inner folds.

She makes a noise for the first time: a sharp little exhale. He smiles and stores it up in his ears. He rubs her outer lips gently with both thumbs, up and down—slowly, like he’s calming a skittish animal. She’s trembling a little bit, but he doesn’t think it’s skittishness.

He lets one thumb slip toward the middle, over her inner folds. She doesn’t make a sound. He thinks she’s determined not to give him the satisfaction. He slides it downward to play over her entrance, not penetrating, just feeling the glide of her juices. She fills his nose: a mouth-watering aroma. Saliva pools in anticipation, and finally he can’t wait any longer.

He dives in with no preliminaries, no teasing, just drinking deeply from the source. His lips form a seal that lets him apply suction, and his tongue desperately curves in pursuit of the only thing he ever wants to taste again. He can’t describe it. His culinary school instructors would disapprove. But all he can think of is the tang of her essence: it’s not floral, not citrus, not spicy or bitter or comparable to any other flavor in the world, because this is _her_.

He devours. His mouth moves wetly, migrating to lavish attention on her clit before it craves her cunt again and returns southward.

He draws sounds out of her, now: overflowing and spilling out. Breaths and pants and chirps and moans, and he wants them, he wants them _all_.

He pauses to breathe, glances up, and registers the fact that she lay back at some point on the metal. She props herself up on her elbows and grunts a protest. More of her hair is escaping her bun, and her lips are stung red—from her own teeth, Ben realizes.

She pants, “Your hand.”

He swallows and brings his middle finger to her entrance, twisting his way inside.

She moans. “No. Well, that too. Give me your other hand.”

He doesn’t know what she wants it for, but he’d gladly relinquish any appendage she asks for. He reaches up toward her and she lies back again, taking hold of his hand and bringing it to her mouth. She says something that he thinks begins with “I need...” but the rest trails off and she sucks two of his fingers into her mouth.

 _He_ moans, then, but stays focused on his responsibility. He carefully works finger the rest of the way into her and curls it as he reapplies his mouth to her clit. She sucks when he does.

His back aches with bending and his cock strains like iron in his pants, but he never wants anything except this. He withdraws his finger and she whimpers around the digits stuffing her mouth, but he returns to bury two. He finds a rhythm but changes it before she can get used to it: slows his hand from a brisk tempo to a lazy crawl, and she clenches around him. His tongue is never idle. He sucks her folds into his mouth and lets his nose bump up against her clit, over and over until his fingers build up to a frantic pace that has her crying out incoherently. The fingers of his northern hand rest in her mouth but she can’t suck anymore, can’t do anything but surrender to the onslaught of his fingers and nose and tongue until it all crescendos to a peak. Ben thrusts his fingers inside, as far as they’ll go, and crooks them over and over as her walls lock him inside. His mouth doesn’t stop, just slows as he works her through it with long laps.

The aftershocks go on and on, until he can’t tell if they truly are aftershocks or more miniature orgasms. Her cunt doesn’t want to let him go.

There are long breathless moments when time doesn’t exist. But then she stills, and it’s done.

Her mouth relinquishes his hand. He gently slides his sopping fingers out of her cunt too and leaves a final lingering kiss there, drinking his last. He did what he set out for. He did what she allowed. It’s over. He mourns it already, barely seconds after it’s gone.

He straightens up slowly, fighting the urge to use a hand to support his aching back. She lies there, chest still rising and falling with the lingering effort of taking the pleasure he gave. He wants to remember her eternally like this: hair spilling out in a debauched halo, lips red and glistening, juices smeared on her thighs. _He_ did that. Ben Solo.

She sits up suddenly. Snaps her thighs shut. She’s all business. “We need to clean the counter.”

“Okay.”

She puts her pants and shoes back on and they clean in silence. The wordless dance. The push and pull of suds and water. The same as always, and completely different.

When they’re finished, he doesn’t know what to say. Lucky for him, she does.

“So does your sense of taste work, after all?” she deadpans.

He smiles in relief. “Yes. I’m cured.”

“I don’t know. You haven’t tried eating _food_. It might still have no flavor for you.”

“What would you advise, doctor?” he asks gravely.

“You should try eating food.”

“Okay.”

“You know...” she hesitates. “I have food in my apartment.”

His heart catches. “Do you.”

“I do,” she says lowly.

“Maybe...” she takes a deep breath. “Maybe you could come eat some.”

He’s loath to breathe, for fear of breaking the spell. “Maybe I could.”

She looks up at him, searching. “Do you want to?”

“Yes.”

She smiles softly. “Okay. Good.” The smile turns mischievous. “Actually, it’s just as well. Because I want to eat too.”

“I can cook for us, if you want.”

“Solo.” She looks him dead in the eyes. “I want to _eat_ , too.”

His face pales as all his blood rushes southward again. He barely stifles a groan.

She’s not finished. “Just as soon as I hear it again.”

“Hear what?”

“I think you know.”

He lunges and pulls her flush against him.

His erection juts into her stomach. He tries to kiss her, but she turns her head at the last second. “Say it,” she whispers, her breath tickling his ear.

He practically growls, “You’re a better cook than me.”

Rey meets his eyes and smiles contentedly. “You said it, not me.”

Then he finally, _finally_ tastes her lips.

And now he has a new favorite flavor.

**Author's Note:**

> I hope you enjoyed! 😘💛
> 
> I’m on [Twitter](https://twitter.com/CeliaAnd2)!


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